1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a recording media processing device, a method of controlling a recording media processing device, and a storage medium storing a program.
2. Related Art
Recording media processing devices (check readers) that have a magnetic head for reading a magnetic ink character line (MICR line) recorded on checks and similar recording media, read the magnetic ink characters contained in the MICR line of the recording medium conveyed through a conveyance path, and recognize each magnetic ink character are known from the literature. See, for example, Japanese Unexamined Patent Appl. Pub. JP-A-2004-206362.
Such recording media processing devices identify (read) each character in the MICR line by magnetic ink character recognition, a process of extracting character waveform data in a range corresponding to one magnetic ink character from the signal waveform data obtained by reading the MICR line, and comparing the difference between the extracted character waveform data and reference waveform data defined by a particular standard for the characters to recognize each magnetic ink character.
Due to deviation in the character width of printed magnetic ink characters, or variation in the pitch when conveying the recording medium through the recording media processing device, distortion in the form of stretching or compression can appear in the waveform of the acquired character waveform data. When this happens, the difference between the character waveform data and the reference waveform data increases, and the recognition rate decreases. Methods of stretching or compressing (scaling) part of the waveform of the reference waveform data to reduce the effect of stretching or compression of the character data waveform and enable magnetic ink character recognition are known from the literature. Scaling the waveform of the reference waveform data is done by, for example, setting a scaling point at one point where the change per unit is small between peaks in the waveform of the reference waveform data, and stretching or compressing the waveform on the right side of this scaling point a specific distance in a specific range.
Some magnetic ink characters, however, have three peaks in the waveform of the reference waveform data. These characters also have at least two locations where the change per unit between peaks is small. Depending upon the character, therefore, scaling the waveform of the reference waveform data at only one scaling point may not improve the recognition rate.